


I stop counting your lies (the numbers are too high and so am I)

by cloudtalking



Series: Ghosts Can't Play Exy [2]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Blood and Gore, M/M, Murder, i love my dead gay son, references to it at least - Freeform, spooky scary skeletons - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2017-10-31
Packaged: 2019-01-27 01:59:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12571196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudtalking/pseuds/cloudtalking
Summary: Andrew shares a smoke with the ghost of Fox TowerAKA: ghosts can't be real OR ghosts can't keep to their writing schedules so have this





	I stop counting your lies (the numbers are too high and so am I)

**Author's Note:**

> I'm gonna be rewriting GCPE!! i wasn't rlly satisfied with it before and I found too many inaccuracies with canon so I'm just gonna start over again and do it better this time!! This is an excerpt from the GCPE storyline so you're not gonna understand it otherwise.

Neil Josten is nothing but a pipedream. Andrew is too high to trust it. It feels as though every step forward is on thin ice. He can almost see reality through the cracks, icy water waiting to wake him up and swallow him whole. 

 

Neil is where he always is, waiting for him on the roof. There’s no Neil Josten in PSU, but there’s one in Fox Tower. He’s always been there, famous for being unknowable. Footsteps running up and down the stairs, treadmills running at top speeds with no one on them, the everlasting smell of smoke.

 

Neil is always surprised to see him, almost falling off the roof when he opens the door.

 

“Andrew, he says, awestruck. “You’re back.”

 

“I live here,” Andrew deadpans, walking over to the edge and sitting so his legs dangle over it. He can feel gravity pulling him down. He lights a cigarette.

 

Neil scrambles to sit closer, though he doesn’t need to walk at all. He manages to cross his legs and fit himself in the space next to Andrew, slouching over so it looks like they could almost be the same height.

 

“It’s Halloween,” Andrew starts when Neil is settled. “It’s chilly and the air scratches your throat when you try to breathe. We have to wear sweaters when we go out now, even if it usually warms up around noon. Nicky says it gives him trust issues.”

 

Neil laughs at that. He’s close enough that Andrew should be able to feel his breath, but nothing’s there.

 

“There’s already brats running around campus. The freshmen like to get a head start.” 

 

“I don’t like sweets.”

 

“Well you’re not a freshman.”

 

“I’m not?” Neil squints. “No, no I’m not anymore. Am I?”

 

“You’re not.” Andrew confirms. 

 

“Huh,” Neil mutters. “Is that weird?”

 

“You’re not that old,” Andrew reminds him. Most of their rooftop conversations include quite a bit of reminding. “You’re only a senior.”

 

“Wild,” Neil muses, nodding slowly. 

 

“Very profound,” Andrew mocks. “Anything more you want to say, Aristotle?”

 

Neil nudges his side, grinning. “Yeah, you’re a dick.”

 

“Wow, really? It’s almost as if I hate you.”

 

“Almost?” Neil raises his eyebrows.

 

“Ninety percent of the time, I want to kill you.”

 

“You’re a bit late to the party,” Neil whispers.

 

Andrew can feel him suddenly, making his heart turn to lead and drop down to his stomach. He grins at the mass of blood and gore that crouched beside him.

 

When Neil is like this, his beauty becomes a horror show. Blood leaks from incisions on his neck and legs where they had been cut off years before. Half his face is smashed in, his normally perfect cheekbones crushed into his nose and upsetting the image of the model boy that Andrew dreams about. 

 

Every part of him is wrecked, but still not ruined. Neil’s mouth, while missing several teeth, is still twisted into his worst grin. He’s still in the perfect position to bolt if the situation calls for it.

 

This is still Andrew’s runner, still his pipedream, just turned into a nightmare. He thinks he likes this better. It’s easier to deal with someone who wants to hurt you than someone who wants to help.

 

“I guess I’ll just have to bring you back then,” Andrew challenges. “Just so I can put you back in the ground.”

 

“You can’t,” Neil says, even his mess of a face showing his disbelief.

 

“I don’t like people telling me what I can or can’t do,” Andrew reminds him. “If I say I can, then I will.”

 

“If you bring me back, I can’t protect them.”

 

“You’re better to them alive than dead.” 

 

“I’m really not,” Neil shakes his head, flinging drops of blood onto Andrew’s sweatshirt. “I couldn’t do them any good when I was alive. Now I can make sure you’re all okay.”

 

“I don’t need protecting,” Andrew says for what has to be the hundredth time. “And bad things will always happen. You can’t stop Matt from getting into a car accident in New York, and you can’t stop Riko from ruining Kevin’s image all the way in Evermore. What use is protection if it means you can never leave the nest?”

 

“I’m not tied to Fox Tower,” Neil shoots back, an unexpected burst of honesty from someone who usually can’t acknowledge the reality of their death. “My home isn’t the place, it’s the people.”

 

“The Foxes,” Andrew guesses. Neil nods.

 

Andrew laughs, sounding in pain more than amused.

 

“That’s pathetic,” he spits out. “The Foxes can’t get their shit together for one season and you stayed behind for them.”

 

Neil shrugs. “It wasn’t entirely selfless,” he admits. “I’m not sure I had much of a choice. I’ve just always been too scared to die.”

 

“Too bad,” Andrew scoffs, putting his cigarette out on the concrete. “You don’t get to choose when you die unless you do it yourself. Even then it’s a lottery.”

 

“I’m not dead,” Neil argues. “This isn’t death, this is nothing.”

 

“You’re nothing, you mean.”

 

“I’m Neil Josten,” he says, back to his usual black hair and grey clothes. 

 

“You are nothing,” Andrew repeats. “You’re just a bad dream.”

 

“I don’t remember the last time I could dream.” Neil picks Andrew’s discarded cigarette up and puts it in his mouth, chasing the ghost of the smoke. “What I do remember is that my brain couldn’t make up worse nightmares than my memories. I like this a lot better.”

 

“Shut up,” Andrew tries to glare at him, the pretty boy with Andrew’s cigarette between his lips. His medication is a mess of miscommunication between his body and his brain, so he smiles anyway. “Dead men tell no tales.”

 

“I’m not spinning a story,” Neil retorts. “This is the truth.”

 

“Quite the novelty,” Andrew says.

 

“How am I supposed to give you a truth for a truth if you refuse to accept that I’m not lying to you?” Neil’s desperation is apparent, laying himself bare in the expressions on his face.

 

“How are we supposed to play this game if you refuse to believe you’re dead?” Andrew counters. “I’m done for today, jog your own memory about bratty children or whatever.”

 

“I’ve got enough bratty children to deal with already,” Neil says pointedly, sending a look which Andrew makes an effort to ignore.

 

It was two steps forward, one step back with him. Always, they started out on uneven footing. Neil was never sure where or when he was until he had something to ground him while Andrew laid out the cold hard facts for the boy to take in. The second Neil did, it was anyone’s game, a back and forth of harsh truths and cutting words that was their own version of doublespeak.

 

“Andrew!” Nicky exclaims, exploding in Andrew’s face as soon as he climbs down from the roof. His knife is out in an instant, and Nicky flinches back instinctively.

 

He bounces back quickly, used to dealing with Andrew’s paranoid mania. 

 

“You were supposed to drive us to Eden’s at least half an hour ago,” Nicky complains, hands on his hips. “I’m not about to let this costume go to waste.”

 

Andrew takes in the furry fox paws and tail, and the barely clothed everything else. 

 

“It already has,” Andrew remarks. Nicky’s answering squawk was offset by Kevin and Aaron’s audible relief when he picked up his keys. “We’re leaving in five.”

 

“Thank god,” Kevin sighs, adjusting the cheap crown on his head and heading to the car. 

 

If Andrew can see hollow eyes staring back at him through the rearview mirror, he doesn’t say anything. He knows it can’t be real. 

**Author's Note:**

> ghosts also can't reply to reviews but find who sent me the ghosts can't give blowjobs ask and i def will
> 
> on tumblr as @twnyards but for the spirit of halloween it's @sethsghost


End file.
